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Today it’s 1996. I am 15 years old. I have a Meg Ryan inspired haircut-which I am not-repeat NOT pulling off well, I weigh 90 lbs, and I’m wearing jnco pants.

To clarify, that would be these:

In my case, my feet were never visible, which I assure you, made me hip. I am lacking boobs and an ass at this point.

Also, I live in the suburbs of Seattle.

So you know, practically Compton.

I have taken up the habit of cruising around in my best-friend’s car, attempting to smoke cigarettes (first time encountering this to be a later post-but let’s just re-emphasize that I am attempting, not really succeeding in smoking said cigarettes), and I have become temporarily obsessed with hip hop. I have started referring to my friends as my homies, I’m convinced that one can never wear enough eyeliner, and if I could figure out how to slick my hair back into a tight ponytail with just two spirals hanging out on either side, you can bet your ass I’d be doing it (aforementioned haircut-an unfortunate side-effect from my previous punk phase despite my desperate desire to become a ganster-excuse me-gangsta).

I am in 10th grade, I am unpopular, and I have acne. I also have been ordered by the orthodontist to wear headgear 14 hours a day, which I am rebelliously not doing (and yes mom, I still defend that decision).

So, I’m in my jncos, with a baby-toll tshirt which shows off my belly-button piercing (which I did myself-again, later post…), in my friend’s car, and we are cruising around parking lots in search of anything interesting.

By interesting, I mean boys. Specifically, cute bad boys.

It says something about the male libido that they’d find me attractive, but the fact that they do works well for me.

This is not prep school readers, this is the ghetto.

Ok, so maybe we all saw Dangerous Minds one too many times, but regardless, here we are.

In a parking lot. In a car. Coughing cigarette smoke and trying to chat up boys.

Our vessel is her 1982 Honda. It was at one time white, it is now various shades of dirt. The driver door does not open so we both have to enter and exit the vehicle via passenger door. We have slurpees instead of alcohol because we cannot get our hands on anything more adventurous than sugar-soaked ice.

We are listening to e40. Specifically, we are listening to this song:

Which is of course, the song of my tenth grade year. The song which inspired the months of begging my mother for a pager. To page, to be paged, is the epitome of cool and I desperately want to be involved.

The song is reminding me that I don’t yet have a pager, but it’s also working in my favor because I know all the words and can bob my head slightly along in a bad-ass manner I learned from movies.

I will sit in that parking lot, in that car, in those jeans for the next three months before I decide I’m a rock girl.